Bring Me To Life
by MissFuneralSong
Summary: After her ship is pulled through the Rift, Jenny arrives in Cardiff and is drawn into the world of Torchwood, just as an ancient and mysterious alien race sets their sinister plan in motion... Fun with pairings - JackJennyIanto triangle later on.
1. Prologue

Bring Me To Life

Prologue: And An Awful Lot of Running to Do

She felt...strange. Not the bad kind of strange, though, most definitely not; she was invigorated, full of energy, and her whole body was filled with a kind of warmth and luminescence, as though _light _were flowing through her veins instead of blood. Her hearts were pounding and she could feel them, both of them, the rhythmic pulsing starting in her chest and her throat and flowing outward so that her entire body was like one huge, solid heartbeat. She hadn't felt like this before.

Before. She'd been shot. The last thing she remembered was her father holding her, telling her that they'd travel together, anywhere she wanted to go. She'd known that it would never happen, that she was dying, but still she'd wanted to believe that maybe she would be all right - that she'd get to experience the joy and wonder of a life with him, just like Donna and Martha, and she saw it in their eyes; the Doctor changed you. It was all in his name, really. He made you better. And she wanted that so much that merely the thought of it made her feel like crying.

She'd died, she was certain of it, and yet she wasn't dead. The pain had gone, her eyes had opened...her father had left her. But she didn't blame him, because if _she'd _thought she was dead then he must have, too. And in a split second, filled with this new heat and energy and drive, she'd decided that she'd be like him. Travelling, saving people, _running_. If she couldn't have that life with _him_ then she'd do it alone, and who knew? She might even find him one day. So she'd hijacked the shuttle and left that planet - that planet that was so _alive _now, because of him - behind, headed for the stars and a life of adventure.

And something had happened.

A blinding light engulfed her ship and she felt herself being _pulled_, yanked through space at an impossible speed, so fast that she didn't even get the chance to think _what's happening? _before it had happened already. The shuttle burst out of the light and into the open, and there was ground below, too close for her to pull up. She crashed. Not the best way to arrive on a brand new planet.

She'd been strapped in, so she was fine aside from a slight pain in her chest where the seatbelt clip had pressed into her. She couldn't say the same for the ship, though. Frantically pressing buttons and flicking switches, she realised that it was dead. Completely dead. She could probably fix it if she had the parts, but who knew if this planet was even inhabited, let alone that technologically advanced? She stared down at the controls blankly as despair washed over her. She could be stuck here. For the rest of her life, stuck here. No adventure, no excitement, no chance of finding her dad. Just this planet, for ever.

Suddenly, there was a banging sound that caused her to very nearly jump out of her skin; someone had found her shuttle, and was...knocking. Sentient life, then? Or just a curious monkey? She decided to find out. Unstrapping herself, pulling the switch that opened the exit hatch, she stepped outside and into the blinding sunshine of a brave new world.

A brave new world that had civilization. Breathing a sigh of relief, she took in the odd, tall sculpture and the huge sort of panel thing with strange words carved in it, a language she didn't understand. Looking down - her feet were on hard, paved ground. Then came a voice from behind her.

"Who are you?"

She whipped round quickly, to see a tall, handsome man in a long coat staring at her, his expression one of mixed bewilderment and curiosity. He didn't appear to be holding a weapon, so she let her muscles untense slightly. And gave him a friendly smile.

"I'm Jenny."

_To be continued._


	2. Chapter One

Bring Me To Life

Chapter One: Meeting Torchwood, Part One

"Jenny, huh?" said the handsome man, giving her a friendly smile with a hint of caution to it; it was obvious that he was a warrior, at least to some degree. Enough to look at everyone as though they might suddenly decide to kill him. But there was also something in him that was reckless and fearless and didn't care whether this fate befell him, as long as he was the only one endangered. Jenny was immediately reminded of her dad. "I'm Captain Jack Harkness," the man went on, still smiling, and Jenny got the feeling that he was thinking some rather untoward thoughts as he stood there staring at her. She didn't particularly mind this, however. He was _very _handsome.

She gave him a bright grin. "Captain," she said in greeting, extending a hand. Jack hesitated for a moment, then took it. They shook. "Are you a military man, then?" Jenny asked, tone conversational. "I was in an army, before I got here. 'Course, the war on my planet's over now, so they're not missing me or anything."

The Captain continued to smile as he stepped closer to her. "Your planet? Yeah, I figured you were an alien - the spaceship's kind of a giveaway, I guess. Where are you from?"

"Messaline," she answered.

Jack pondered her reply for several moments. "Messaline...nope, never heard of it." Then he gave her a once-over with his eyes, half in the way he'd been doing before, but half like he was examining her for signs of being hostile or dangerous in some way. "Human? You look it, but I've learned never to be too sure."

"Human," confirmed Jenny automatically, then realised that she wasn't. She was a Time Lord, technically. Best not spread it around, though, she reasoned; if the Time Lords were all supposed to be gone now, then people finding out that she was one would probably draw unwanted attention.

"All right then." Captain Jack took her gently by the elbow and steered her over to the tall statue, leading her onto a seemingly ordinary paving stone. Jenny would have protested had she not been so curious about this world and this man and, indeed, this paving stone, which suddenly began its descent down into the ground.

She looked up at the man as they sunk below ground-level. "Where are you taking me?"

"Sorry about this," he replied, flashing her a toothy and slightly apologetic grin. "But your ship - and you - came through the Rift, so I gotta take you in and run some tests." He raised his hands in a gesture of peace when Jenny shot him a startled look. "Don't worry, it won't hurt. Unless you turn out to be some alien psycho-killer, in which case, yeah. It kinda will hurt."

Jenny was about to assert that she most certainly was _not _an alien psycho-killer, when the interior of their destination came into view, and her words were replaced by an intake of breath. The place was enormous, full of walkways and computers and wires and technology, all sorts of wondrous things that she'd never seen on Messaline. _This _was what she'd been hoping for; discovering new civilizations, and with them new inventions, marvels of the universe. While she was taking all this in, a giant, flying reptile swooped over their heads and screeched loudly, making Jenny instinctively duck and let out a small cry. Jack laughed.

"Don't mind the pterodactyl," he told her as she straightened up. "It won't bite, as long as you stay outta the barbeque sauce."

"What _is _this place?" she breathed, as the paving stone elevator came to a halt. "It's _fantastic_!"

Jack gave her an odd look at this last word, but quickly replaced it with his default, jovial expression. "This is Torchwood's Hub," he said. "It's where we work, protecting the Earth from hostile aliens." He smirked. "Arming the human race against the future."

"We?" inquired Jenny, but no sooner had she said it than the answer to her query became apparent; a man and a woman were walking toward them, both eyeing Jack with suspicion before turning cautious eyes on Jenny.

The woman, who had a great deal of long, dark hair and several faint freckles on her face, addressed the Captain in an odd accent that Jenny hadn't heard before. "Who's this, then, Jack?"

The man, shorter than Jack and wearing a light pink dress-shirt and black suit and vest, simply stared at Jenny, in a way that made her feel as though she were less welcome here than the plague. She shifted uncomfortably. "I'm Jenny," she said in a submissive tone, as if the words were a kind of peace offering. "I came here in my ship - crashed here. Just outside."

"From the Rift?" the man asked, speaking to Jack. He appeared to want to avoid contact with Jenny at all costs, and she was left wondering what it was she'd done wrong.

Jack nodded in reply, raising his eyebrows in what seemed a mild warning. "From a planet called Messaline. Says she's human, and she seems nice enough to me." The other man muttered, "Of course she does, she's _blonde_," but the Captain either didn't hear this or simply ignored it, turning to Jenny. "This is my team, or half of it. Gwen Williams, nee Cooper" - he gestured to the woman, who smiled - "and Ianto Jones." Indicating the man, who continued to frown, trying to look everywhere but at Jenny.

"Want us to take her to Martha?" Ianto asked, looking up at Jack pleadingly, his expression seeming to say _Make Gwen do it, not me_.

"Actually," said the Captain, his face twisting into a sly smile, "I think we can leave that for later, Martha's busy wrapping up that last case. And Gwen, I need you with me for a minute." He laid a hand on Jenny's back, urging her forward off the lift, stepping off after her. "Ianto, could you give Jenny here the tour? Wouldn't want our guest to get bored waiting for us, now, would we?" With a wink at Jenny and a quick "see you in a bit", he walked off in the direction of an office-like room with Gwen, both of them entering and Jack closing the door with a forbidding sort of _click_.

Leaving Jenny and Ianto alone.

_Fantastic_.

She swung her arms absentmindedly as awkward silence enveloped them both, then adjusted the hem her green shirt without quite realising she was doing it. If she had been looking at Ianto at that moment, Jenny would have seen him link his hands behind his back and rock slightly on the balls of his feet.

"So," she began, trying to break the tension in the air with some friendly small-talk.

"So," echoed Ianto. His rocking came to a gentle halt, and he cast around for something to say or do. Then he seemed to grasp it, finally looking into the girl's face, managing a hint of a smile albeit a formal one. "Would you like a coffee?"

Jenny noticed that he had the same accent as the woman Gwen, although slightly less pronounced. "Yes, thanks," she said, although she didn't really like coffee too much; she was more of a tea person. Not that she'd gotten the chance to try either during her very short life so far. It was just one of those things she knew.

Without another word, Ianto started to wander off, presumably to the kitchen. Caught between not wanting to be left on her own in an unfamiliar environment and not wanting to continue with the stifling awkwardness between the man and herself, Jenny decided to accompany him. Besides, she considered that he might get in trouble from Jack for not keeping an eye on her.

_To be continued._


	3. Chapter Two

Bring Me To Life

Chapter Two: Meeting Torchwood, Part Two

"So, d'you mind telling me why you left that girl out there with just Ianto to watch her?" Gwen folded her arms, surveying Jack with a stern expression as he sat down behind his desk.

"Ianto can take care of himself," was the Captain's unconcerned, airy reply.

Gwen goggled at him, shocked into temporary silence by the man's utter apathy, not to mention total disregard of the rules _he_, as their leader, was meant to enforce. "Yes, Jack, but he doesn't know what she is! None of us do, not yet!" She leaned forward, placing her hands on the desktop. "Are we just supposed to take her _word _for it, that she's human?"

Jack shook his head vaguely. "I just..." He paused, trying to find words to express the odd feelings of trust that Jenny envoked in him, despite the fact he'd only known the girl for a few minutes. She felt somehow _familiar _to him, although he couldn't for the life of him figure out why. And he was inexplicably certain that the last thing Jenny was likely to do was hurt any of them. It was going to be difficult, however, to explain to Gwen why her concern was completely unnecessary. So Jack settled for, "It's fine, Gwen. Just leave it. It's fine."

She sighed, fuming at him but knowing that to press the matter further would get her nowhere. "All right then," said Gwen, addressing the other issue that was on her mind. "Why did you call me up here? And give me that sneaky look?"

Jack's answer was short, simple and delivered with a smile. But made no sense to Gwen whatsoever. "Because Ianto's jealous."

Gwen blinked. "Come again?" she said, disbelieving. "You...because he's _jealous_? Of who? That girl, Jenny?"

"Yep."

She stepped back away from the desk, placing one hand on her hip and running the other one through her hair in exasperation. "Jack Harkness, I hope you realise that you have gone _completely _insane. You called me into your office and left Ianto with some girl who came through the Rift in a spaceship...because he's _jealous_ of her." The Captain just restated his previous confirmation of this, so Gwen tried a different approach. "Why would you do that? What _possible _reason could you have?"

Jack looked up at the woman, face serious. "Me and Ianto are..." He paused, and Gwen rolled her eyes to indicate that she knew how that sentence ended. They _all _knew how that sentence ended. "Yeah, so it's _me_. He's gotta learn not to take it so seriously, the flirting thing. Flirting-mode is my default state of being.. If he doesn't loosen up he's gonna go crazy."

Gwen's eyebrows shot up. "So you're teaching him a lesson?"

The man laughed. "Yeah, I guess so."

She appeared to give this revelation intense mental scrutiny for a while, before relaxing her posture and saying, "Fair enough."

--

Meanwhile, Jenny was experiencing coffee for the first time.

Ianto had led her to the coffee machine and made a cup for her, then one for himself, politely offering her milk and sugar, which she graciously accepted. Then he'd taken her to what was apparently a conference room, a long table surrounded by some chairs, with a large and currently blank display screen at the head of it. They sat opposite each other, looking into their mugs and not saying anything; or rather, not knowing _what _to say.

Jenny took a sip of her coffee, not wanting it to go cold and have to be wasted. After all, Ianto had gone to the trouble of making it for her, and now he'd stopped flashing her the occasional looks of resentment she'd been getting from him since her arrival; she thought perhaps he'd revert to that state again if she didn't drink the coffee. And besides, it wasn't bad.

"So you're from another planet, eh?" piped up Ianto, quietly and unexpectedly. "What's it like, where you came from?"

"Messaline?" said Jenny, taking a moment to consider it. "Well, I wasn't really there for long. Less than a day, now I come to think of it."

Ianto stared at her, mouth slightly agape. "You what?"

She gave him a look. "I was only born today, silly. I'm a child of the machine, all my people are. Grown from a tissue sample."

The man didn't appear able to grasp this concept, and Jenny realised that they must not have that sort of technology here. She watched him nervously for his response, hoping that the odd circumstances of her birth hadn't just made things even more awkward.

"Well," Ianto managed, gazing at the surface of his coffee as though it was the most interesting thing in the world. "That's...erm. Different." He paused. "So you're only a day old?"

Jenny nodded, watching him intently over the top of her mug as she took another sip of her now-lukewarm coffee. _Maybe I shouldn't have said anything_, she thought to herself, anxiety making her stomach knot. The look in her eyes was unintentionally nervous, and a little bit vulnerable. "Is...is that all right? I mean...it doesn't...freak you out or anything?"

"No, no!" Ianto asserted hurriedly. "No, not at all. It's quite interesting, actually."

Jenny beamed at him in relief. Then something that had been nagging at her for several minutes now, right in the back of her mind, drowned out by the glaring mind-noise of the now-evaporated tension, came bubbling up to the surface. "You said..._Martha_. I know someone called Martha."

And then suddenly, somewhere in the depths of Jenny's brain, something was shifted. Her eyes glazed over for a moment, and when her thought patterns returned to normal, Jenny didn't know someone called Martha anymore.

_To be continued._


End file.
